The fact is, that Machiavelli, as is usual with those against whom no crime can be proved, was suspected of and charged with atheism; and the first and last most violent opposers of _The Prince_ were both Jesuits, one of whom persuaded the Inquisition "benchè fosse tardo," to prohibit the treatise, and the other qualified the secretary of the Florentine republic as no better than a fool.

I buy the Guardian when I'm not in a bate about drivel like this because I want well written soundly researched intelligent copy, not the poltical equivilant of whether some surgically ehanced tardo has a new bloke and is in luvvv.